The present invention relates to a variable-magnification image processing apparatus capable of changing magnification of an image to be displayed on a display screen.
A technique where an image is displayed on a display screen of a display device, such as a liquid crystal display monitor, in an equal pixel magnification display style to enable a user to check, for example, a focus state of the image is known. The term “equal pixel magnification display style” means that an image is displayed on a display screen in such a manner that pixels of the image have a one-to-one relationship with pixels of the display screen, without converting each pixel value of the image to an approximate value. Japanese Patent Provisional Publication No. 2007-174693A (hereafter, referred to as a “patent document 1”) describes an example of an apparatus capable of displaying a picked up image in the equal pixel magnification display style.
When the apparatus described in patent document 1 is set to a focus checking mode, the display magnification of an image on an image display unit is defined such that the display magnification can be changed in a range from a magnification where an image having a maximum pixel number is displayed approximately in the equal pixel magnification style to a magnification where an image having a minimum pixel number is displayed approximately in the equal pixel magnification style.